Black Caucus Says Gov. Deal May Be Open To Fewer Children Tried As Adults

Legislation passed nearly 20 years ago mandating that some children be prosecuted as adults and locked up for years is getting a fresh look from members of the general assembly and possibly the governor.

JJIE.org has confirmed that in a recent meeting with someGeorgia Legislative Black Caucusmembers, new Governor Nathan Deal stated that he is willing to reassess Senate Bills 440 and 441. The development comes on the heels of prison overcrowding concerns Governor Deal, a former juvenile court judge, expressed last month during his first state-of –the-state address.

“The governor has indicated that he is open to discussions about this; the speaker of the house (David Ralston) said the same when we met with him a few days later,” says Georgia State Senator Emanuel Jones (D-10) “Texas and Alabama are taking the lead on reforming these laws. These laws were passed during a time 15 to 16 years ago when both parties were trying to ‘out tough’ each other on crime. Now the cost of lock ‘em up and throw away the key legislation has become a financial burden on the state.”

Governor Deal’s Press Secretary Stephanie Mayfield would not confirm his position on SB 440 and SB 441, calling juvenile justice system reform “a very broad topic” but “one of great importance.” However, in a written statement to JJIE.org, Mayfield said any impending bills proposing changes to SB 440 and SB 441, “need to first complete the legislative process in order for Gov. Deal to evaluate them in their full form. Gov. Deal recently had a good and productive meeting with members of the Black Caucus and they shared many of the same concerns. He looks forward to working with the members as they move forward on these significant issues.”

Caucus member Sen. Vincent Fort, (D-39) did not attend the Jan. 25 meeting, but he says he’s not surprised by Governor Deal’s remarks in light of the state's recession-driven budget shortfall estimated at $1.5 billion.

“What’s happened is the conservative law and order hawks are coming to understand that lock em’ up and throw away the key is not a productive approach,” says Sen. Fort of the "two strikes and you're out" laws popularized in the 1990s. “So what you have now are conservatives looking at these changes for fiscal reasons and liberals like me looking at these changes from an equal justice standpoint.”

One out of 31 Americans are under some form of correctional control. The number jumps to one out of every 13 in Georgia and one out of nine for African-Americans in the state.

Passed in 1994, SB 440 requires children between the ages of 13 and 17 to be prosecuted as adults when accused of committing one of the "seven deadly sins" in Georgia, including murder, rape, armed robbery (with a firearm), aggravated child molestation, aggravated sodomy, aggravated sexual battery and voluntary manslaughter.

Once convicted in Superior Court under SB 440, SB 441 imposes a minimum 10-year sentence without the possibility of parole. In some circumstances juveniles may end up serving life in prison without the possibility of parole. Those children serve their sentences in adult prisons.

Jones says the changes being discussed would leave that decision up to juvenile court judges. More sentencing discretion, he says, would be a win-win for both ends of the political spectrum.

“It costs $57 a day to incarcerate individuals; it’s $237 for juveniles,” says Jones. “That’s more than $70,000 per year, per child. The governor is looking at ways to trim the budget and changes to 440 and 441 would go a long way.”

Any legislation aimed at cutting the number of children incarcerated byGeorgia Department of Juvenile Justice(DJJ) – currently about 20,000 – could potentially save the state hundreds of thousands of dollars each year.

State Rep. Billy Mitchell (D-88), who also attended the caucus meeting with the governor, says he too supports major penal system reform.

“We need to spend less money on incarceration and more on prevention and treatment so we won’t be warehousing so many people in our prisons,” says Sen. Mitchell, the minority chief deputy whip. “I agree with the governor that our efforts to appear tough on crime have created a system that is so expensive.”

Sen. Jones says during the caucus meeting, Governor Deal also indicated that he is open to the idea of instituting a juvenile court parole board in Georgia. He has been working closely with newly appointed DJJ Commissioner Amy Howell on drafting a 23-page bill proposing the idea. The legislation could be introduced as early as this week.

“The way the law is written, a criteria would be developed to determine which juveniles would be considered for parole,” he says. “DJJ would empower the panel or board to make that decision.”

In her first official interview as commissioner, Howell told JJIE.org that the measure would allow judges to review the sentences of designated felons who have accomplished the terms of their sentence – everything from completing a General Equivalency Diploma to maintaining the highest behavioral status in the juvenile detention facility. DJJ would provide that information and allow a judge to make a final determination.

Major policy changes like this one are necessary, she says, for DJJ to fulfill its mission amid the agency’s recent wave of massive budget cuts.

“We want to give the discretion back to judges,” she says. “That’s a door that has been closed for quite some time.”

Sen. Jones says details would have to be worked out, but helping children become productive members of society is at the heart of the bill.

“If a kid has been rehabilitated why keep them there,” he says. “Allow them to get out and move on with their life. We would have to decide how they would be supervised.”

For now, though, he’s optimistic that the changes may happen for Georgia.

“I’ve been in this [governing] body for six years now and not one moment before now had I ever considered that such legislation would ever make it out of committee,” he says. “Because the governor uttered those words in his state-of-the-state, it makes it possible. We now have this opportunity due to shrinking assets. I’m encouraged by some of the things that I’ve been hearing.”

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Got a juvenile justice story idea? Contact JJIE.org staff writer Chandra R. Thomas at cthom141@kennesaw.edu. Thomas, a former Rosalynn Carter Mental Health Journalism Fellow and Kiplinger Public Affairs Journalism Fellow, is an award-winning multimedia journalist who has worked forFox 5 News in Atlanta and People, Essence and Atlanta magazines.

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Thomas is a 2011 Soros Justice Media Fellow and a former Rosalynn Carter Mental Health Journalism Fellow and Kiplinger Public Affairs Journalism Fellow. She is an award-winning multimedia journalist who has worked for Atlanta Magazine and Fox 5 News in Atlanta.

One thought on “Black Caucus Says Gov. Deal May Be Open To Fewer Children Tried As Adults”

What about the children that have been convicted as adults and serving time. Many children, 13-17, were charged as adults but charges were reduced but still sentenced as adults. Meaning, an armed robbery was reduced for a 15 year old to robbery but the 15 year old is still sentenced to anywhere from 1-20 years in prison. The reformation should address this issue and make these children eligible for parole. Taking a 15 year old out of school to serve years in prison seems ineffective when there are many alternatives available. Furthermore, the longer they stay in prison the more institutionalized they become.